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"Skate" Update: Day 15

Code Name "Skate" Has Been Retired

As many of you know, the little kitten that we have rescued and nursed back to health after a close call with death was dubbed "Skate" (short for Stray Kitty Eight). We always considered "Skate" to be a code name--you know, like Apple uses code names for their Mac operating systems like "Leopard". So after MUCH deliberation we have decided on a more fitting name for the kitten. Her full name "Lucy Maud" with "Lucy" as her everyday name. [She is named after one of our favorite authors, Lucy Maud Montgomery who wrote Anne of Green Gables as well as many other literary classics.] So now she shall be known as Lucy when we give updates here.

Lucy NewsLucy (formerly "Skate") has continued to grow and get healthy. Her legs seem to stretch overnight! She's probably going to be one tall kitty when she's grown. Her fur is growing in nice and thick with blond frosted tips to it. It's looking quite luxurious.

Lucy is also learning how to socialize with the other cats in a controlled setting (namely my studio). The cats that are interested are allowed to come in and check her out. During Lucy's closed-door-supervised-romp-time, a couple of the cats have been brave enough to come in and "observe" (Lucy doesn't let them be passive onlookers for long).

Dexter was the first to really decide that he needed to be on everything as far as the kitten was concerned. I think he's just interested in figuring out how to sneak kitten chow out of her bowl through the bars of her habitat cage.

Then, surprisingly, our little diva Thomasina decided to be in on the action. She established who was boss very quickly and now regularly asks to come in and play with Lucy during romp time. It's quite cute to see Thomasina and Lucy playing among the different boxes and play tunnels I have laid out for Lucy. Lucy doesn't feel threatened because Thomasina is so small and Thomasina still feel like she has the upper paw.

The next cat to be interested in interaction was Suzette. Suzette likes to lay on the floor with her tummy exposed and have Lucy charge her. Lucy is fearless and will come at her with all her kitten self puffed up and "scary". When Suzette has had enough, she politely asks to be let out of the studio.

Today during romp time, Thomasina was in the studio quietly playing with Lucy. I was working on the computer when I was aware of some noise in Lucy's habitat cage. It was more thumping than usual. I turned around to find that Thomasina had crawled in and was curled up in the bottom of Lucy's kitty condo. Lucy was in the second story of the condo peering down into the first story through the internal hole that connects the two and was swatting Thomasina on the head as if to say "Get out! This is MY home!"

I grabbed the camera. When I started focusing to get a shot, Lucy turned around to face me (she is SO curious!) so I got a picture of her with her "evil eyes" because of the flash. After snapping off a couple of shots with the camera, I then proceeded to extricate a protesting Thomasina out of Lucy's kitty condo. There was a lot of complaining, I'll tell you! Thomasina is a whiner, and she was whining at me the whole way out. Fortunately, she didn't hold it against me and wanted to cuddle with me shortly thereafter.

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Aaw that is so nice to see! And nice name too! When you said about Lucy sticking her fur up and being "scary", it reminded me of a video on my mobile of Jack and Malaika playing, a couple of the kittens I fostered. They were just learning to walk and after rolling over a couple of times, Malaika stood up, walked (very wobbly) towards Jack and arched her back, like she was trying to be scary. Each time I watch it, it makes me giggle. Looking forward to the next "Lucy Update"!You're roses from the previous post are absolutely beautiful! Oh I can't wait to get a proper garden. I think between myself and mum, we would like to grow almost every type of plant! I love lillies, Beth (little sis) loves roses and Mum loves fuschias.I'm glad you got such a lovely present for Christmas. You're lucky you have such a thoughtful hubby!All the best, love from Meg (the kittens' mother)xxx

Glad to see that Skate has her forever name now (to go with her forever home!) I can just picture her doing her fierce ninja kitten routine...I've missed having bonzai kitties rampaging around, ambushing each other, as the youngest catchild now is Spunky Boomerang, and he's about 3 1/2. They do tear round the house plenty, but it's not quite like with kittens, all springs and rubber bands.